2002-08-17 - 11:58 p.m.

Chess Tournament in the 'Hood

Well, today was the day of the big chess tournament outside in the bad part of Frown Town. I'd kind of been dreading this day, although that's probably too strong of a word. I just didn't anticipate that the tournament was going to be any kind of a success. It already had two strikes against it: it was being held OUTSIDE, during the dog days of August, and it was being held in the worst part of Frown Town, the part known colloquially as "The Hill." Every year you'd hear about a half dozen shootings up on The Hill.

On the other hand, the City Mission, the sponsors of the event wanted to run a chess tournament, and as far as I'm concerned, anyone who willing to do that deserves my support. Of course I knew that one of the City Mission's goals was to get people to come into the area and see that it wasn't so bad after all, and to help promote an intellectual, cultural activity among the people who lived there.

The fact is that such things are always inherently risky, but what else are you going to do? Just sit there on your ass and wait for things to get better by themselves?

The tournament was held at a park in the middle of the hill, and it was sort of a bleak setting. The park really looked like more of a vacant lot, about a third the size of a small city block. There was a basketball court, and a couple of picnic tables in the shade of two or three trees. The park would have looked a little cheerier if the grass wasn't all brown, but until recently there hasn't been much rain. I also saw quite a bit of broken glass around.

When I got there I saw that my guess had been correct: the turnout was very light. In addition to myself there were two other people from the Frown Town Chess Club, a couple of City Mission employees and their children, as well as a couple of other residents of the Hill, making for ten in all. The organizers had originally planned to have a rated and an unrated section, but the low turnout made them compact the field into one large section.

I was the highest rated player there, which is getting to be par for the course at the local tournaments I go to. However, the second highest rated player was the director of the event, a guy named John who had beaten me the last time we played. There was one other rated person, rated about 750 points below me. Everyone else was unrated.

Since the main sponsor was the City Mission, the tournament opened with a prayer. This is the first time I've ever seen such a thing, but I felt it couldn't hurt. Besides, I felt I was a guest and had no right to complain.

My first round opponent was one of the local unrated guys, a older, thin black fellow with a grizzled beard named Robert. The church had provided some sodas and Danish pastries for the players, and this fellow took an entire ring-cake for himself, which he ate right out of the box.

Robert should have been easy for me to beat, but that's not exactly what happened. Playing black he chose a really dreadful opening that I should have been able to roll up, but somehow he was able to equalize. When I saw that what he was doing I tried an unsound idea that wound up costing me a pawn.

Here's a curious fact about playing chess: when you're doing well in a game noises and other distractions don't seem that annoying, but when you're doing badly EVERYTHING bothers you. This was far from a typical tournament situation, and there were a lot of distractions. For starters, we were outside. Because we were all sitting in the shade, and it was still before noon it wasn't nearly as hot as I'd been dreading. However, outside is NOISY. We were playing chess in a park, and everyone else wasn't going to be quiet just because some guys were playing chess. Children were squealing and guys were playing basketball behind me.

Most of the people present had never been to a chess tournament, so they talked to each other during their games, and for the most part didn't use chess clocks. I didn't use a clock in any of the games I played, and oddly enough I think this made me play faster than I would have ordinarily.

Like I said before, I felt like I was a guest and had no right to complain. The point of the day was for everyone to have a good time, and not to blindly follow a bunch of chess rules.

However, none of this made me feel better about my crappy, pawn-down game against Robert. How did he get such a good game out of such a lame-ass opening? Since his king was uncastled and still in the center, I tried to open up the game. He defended incorrectly, and I got my pawn back with a good game. Another oversight on his part got me a piece. Whew! However, he got some pressure for the piece, and could have equalized again, but he missed a strong move. After he traded off the queens I knew I had an easy win.

Then came an intervention from an unexpected source. A guy behind me shooting baskets lost control of the ball and it landed in the middle of the board, then bounced up and hit my opponent in the face. When I turned around to retrieve the ball another one bounced in a mud pudding right next to me, splashing me and my equipment. The guy was apologetic, but not terribly. My opponent seemed rather shaken up, but I was able to reconstruct the position pretty easily - there were not many pieces left on the board. I won shortly thereafter. My opponent resigned one move before I was going to checkmate him, which is typical for unrated players - they tend to fight to the death.

After my close call with Robert, I was taking the tournament a lot more seriously, even though I found out it wasn't going to be rated. The fellow rated just under me had been held to a draw by his unrated opponent. He had dropped out of the event, not because of the draw but because he was only playing to make sure that there was an even number of players. When someone else dropped out after the first round, he withdrew as well. I was now the highest rated person in the event by 760 points. It was a little embarrassing.

My second round opponent was a City Mission employee named Nicolas, who kept apologizing for how bad his play was, but I could tell he was a stronger player than Robert. He seemed like a friendly guy, but I think the constant apology about his play was just a dodge, a distraction. However, he played a bad opening against me and his game quickly turned very bad. I checkmated him on move 15.

I had been planning to get some lunch after the second round, but the games were going so quickly, I didn't see the point in leaving. I went right into the third game. My opponent here was a suburban father named Herman, and he was a volunteer helper at the mission. He had been the person to draw the tournament director in the first round, so I knew he was no pushover.

However, as things turned out he was very easy to beat. He played a dubious opening, and then dropped a piece on move 10. The rest of the game was just a mopping-up operation.

I was now the only person left with a 3-0 record. My opponent the lat round was a little boy with 2-1, the son of the guy organizing the tournament.

Ah, playing chess against children - not one of my favorite things to do. I was playing black and my young opponent chose a variation I didn't happen to like, but I'm sure this was totally by accident. However, I made a bad move which wound up losing an important center pawn, and the little boy jumped on it. I was in trouble. I was a clear pawn down, and he had the better position. I was resigning myself to a long unpleasant grind when he just gave me a piece for free. The main sin of young players: moving too quickly.

I soon consolidated with me extra piece and had an easy win. At one point he made a move, taking one of my pawns with his knight and forking my two rooks. He said "thanks for the rook," but I restrained myself from saying "thanks for the knight" after I captured it with the bishop he had obviously missed. Now I was two pieces up. The game was over shortly after that.

So I had gone 4-0 and won the tournament - not really such a feat considering how badly I outrated everyone there. Yet - in my first and last games I had very bad positions - I should have lost.

The last game to finish determined second place, and it was between the guys I had played in rounds two and three: Nicolas and Herman. Early on Herman won a piece and it looked like the game was his. However, you can't predict how games between unrated players will turn out. Nicolas was joking about what a bad player he was, but Herman was becoming flustered with his obvious advantage. He made a blunder and lost a rook, and then Nicolas held on like grim death to his extra material until he was able to force a win.

Something odd happened during the game. A photographer from the newspaper I work for showed up, and since Nicolas and Herman were the only people playing he started to take pictures of them. For some reason this freaked Nicolas out, and he literally ran away. He refused to have his picture taken, even from the back. So while Herman pondered his next move, someone else who wasn't even playing sat in Nicholas' chair so the photographer could get his picture.

For winning the tournament I got a little money and a little plaque, which was kind of cute. I also got the chance to play a blitz game against the father of the organizer, a fellow who had been an international player in the 1960s and had been champion of India nine (!!) times. He was clearly a little out of practice, but he was still an International Master while I'm just a local expert.

He let me play white, but he chose a variation I hadn't seen in a long time. The line I played was good enough for the local people I used to face, but he quickly equalized. He then miscalculated and lost a piece while winning a pawn. I was a piece up, but time was running out and I couldn't co-ordinate my pieces. I blundered and he got his piece back with a winning game. He was grinding down when he finally noticed that my time had run out.

I wasn't upset that I had lost, in fact winning would have probably been more uncomfortable. I rather liked the master, and he seemed like a friendly, personable guy.

Nicolas, having come in second got his chance at the Master as well. He got a decent game, then lost a pawn. He got some play for it, and was pushing the master around a bit. Then he overplayed his hand and made a blunder that cost a rook. After that it was an easy clean-up situation for the Master.

The tournament now over, I went and got a late lunch. My day was far from over - I now had five hours of work ahead of me on the comic order forms with the Manager. Luckily my stomach had decided to give me a nausea-free day.

So, the tournament on the Hill was actually kind of a pleasant experience, but with the low turnout I don't really think it could be called a success. I hope the City Mission runs it next year. Maybe indoors would be a better idea. For all my misgivings, the worst thing that happened to me all day was a case of mild sunburn.